Page 7 of Cold Foot Croc (Wreck’s Mountains #3)
Physically, Garret always felt great after a Change. It was the mental side he struggled with. The shame, and the wishing he could go back to his exact old self and be normal.
He stumbled on a slick rock under the snow and righted himself before he carried on. His sweater was in his clenched fist. His skin was steaming with the heat left over from the Change, and he was in a pissy mood. He wanted to be back to camp, sending Raynah a good-morning text and feeling better about being a shifter, because she was a shifter and she didn’t seem to hate it, and good gah, right about now, he needed that kind of positive attitude to rub off on him.
Nah, that wasn’t even why he was so eager to talk to her. He’d kind of…missed her. Which was insane because he was barely conscious when he was the bear, but he had. There it was. Maybe the bear missed her too, he didn’t know.
He could smell beef cooking, which meant he was getting close to camp, so he quickened his step.
The drone had been buzzing over him off and on all night, probably between Dylan napping. It was equipped with night vision, which had been a game-changer in tracking his movements.
Campfire smoke was visible just above the trees toward his right, so he changed course and headed that way.
What he hadn’t been prepared for was the scent of Raynah.
With a frown, he lifted his chin into the air and sniffed again, and yep, it was there. Faintly, but it was there.
What the hell?
He strode past the last few layers of trees and entered the clearing where his truck was parked. The tent sat covered in about an inch of snow.
Dylan was nowhere to be seen, but Raynah was bent over the cast-iron pan, flipping steaks. She had eggs frying on a cast-iron skillet.
She wore this adorable little frown of concentration, but looked up at him as he approached.
“Lenace,” he greeted her from behind his growing smile. She was here. She was really here.
“Nice tattoos,” she complimented him, pointing to his sleeve of ink.
He glanced down, and then back to her. She was standing stiffly and rubbing her lower back like it was aching.
“Here, let me cook. You go sit down. Where’s Dylan?”
“Sleeping. He was up most of the night worrying over you. We took shifts.”
“How? Why?” He took the fork from her hand and stared at her pretty face and her tired smile. “How are you here right now?”
“Your brother knows your phone password, so you should maybe change that if you want privacy. I will absolutely refuse to send you nudes until you do so. Not that I would send you nudes in my current state. I feel like a whale on the beach.”
Nudes. He went dumb at the mention of nudes, just imagining her curves and those full tits that were pushing against the tight sweater he could see under her unzipped jacket.
“Hello?” she asked, waving to him.
“You said nudes.”
Her laugh was pretty and filled the clearing.
“Wait, okay, so Dylan had my password?”
“Yeah, he got my number from your ‘Hot Croc’ contact and called me late last night.”
“Why the hell would he do that?” he asked, growing angry. Did Dylan like her? Was he trying to mess with her?
“He is worried about your long Changes.”
“I’m fine,” he grumbled, checking the steaks.
She scooped the half-dozen fried eggs onto a paper plate, and when she stood again, she looked uncomfortable. His anger disappeared in an instant.
“Here, come sit down. Let me do all this. You just rest. You shouldn’t be all the way out here worrying over me, Raynah. I’m okay. You should be warm in your comfortable bed.”
“Oh!” she yelped as she sat down in the camp chair.
“What?” he asked, panicked as he rushed to her.
Her eyes had gone all round, and her lips curved up into the most beautiful smile he’d ever witnessed. “Feel.” She pulled his hand to the swell of her stomach, and under his palm, something rolled.
He flinched back, surprised.
“I’m sorry,” she said, and the smile on her pretty face faltered.
That was the baby. That was really the baby he’d felt. Garret squatted there in front of her, searching her clear green eyes. “Why did you say sorry?”
“Because you moved away. Not everyone likes to feel that stuff. I’m…” She shook her head, and now there was red in her cheeks.
“Can I touch it with both hands?”
The smile came back, and his heart thumped so hard against his sternum as she nodded.
Slowly, Garret slid his hands into the open zipper of her jacket. He cupped her belly and waited.
Thump. A strong little kick hit his left hand, and his mouth fell open with a big smile for her. “Did you feel that?” he whispered, afraid he would break the magic spell.
She nodded again, and looked so happy.
She cupped her hands over his and moved his right one upward on her belly, then pressed it down. Thump.
Fuck, what was this feeling? There was no cold, no pain, no confusion, no regret. Nothing existed but the feel of her taut belly in his hands, and the baby moving within.
“He’s strong,” he murmured.
“Do you want to know what he will be?” she asked him softly.
“A crocodile,” he guessed.
She shook her head, and the worry was back on her face.
“What will he be?”
“A jackal.”
She seemed to be waiting for his response, but he didn’t know what she needed from him. “Like a coyote?”
“Similar.”
He grinned. “Well that’s pretty fucking cool. Freaking cool, I mean. I bet he’ll be fast. I bet you’ll have a hard time catching him if he decides to run.”
She laughed. “I will have to put him on one of those kid-leashes if he turns out to be a runner.”
A laugh escaped him, and he moved his hands to a different part of her belly. The baby rolled. “This is so cool.”
“Your steaks are getting cold,” she pointed out.
“I don’t care. This is more fun than eating.”
“Well, you’re supposed to be eating a lot. And also, where is your jacket?”
He tilted his head toward the tent. “Over there. I’m not cold. So his dad’s a jackal?”
She pursed her lips and nodded. “You think it’s okay that the baby will be a jackal?”
“Hell yeah. At least he isn’t like a frog shifter or something.”
She snorted. “A porcupine?”
“Yeah, or like one of those salamander things.”
“Or a goldfish.”
“Yeah, a jackal is way cooler than all of those. He can bite people if they bully him.”
“Well, he will have the ability to Turn people.”
“Oh, right. So no biting.”
“No biting,” she agreed. She inhaled sharply, and in a thick voice she whispered, “His dad was not a good man.”
He searched her eyes, and hated the sadness he found there. What had she been through?
He scooted a little closer and slid his hands farther into her coat, all the way around to her lower back, and began to massage gently there. He knew she was aching. She rolled her eyes closed, exhaled a breath, and relaxed against his touch.
“You won’t let him be like his dad. He will be like you.”
“I’m not much better,” she whispered. “You know what I’ve done. Dylan told me you found out.”
“Did Harold Price deserve it?”
She nodded. “He deserved worse.”
“Then good job.”
“You shouldn’t say that. I killed a man.”
“A bad man. And then you went to jail, and then you got pregnant by a bad man in there, and now you are out. And now you have a chance to set all that right by raising a good man. You’re going to put a good man in the world. I know you will.”
Her eyes rimmed with tears, and she ducked her gaze. “Yeah?” she said thickly. “I never thought about it like that.”
“Yeah, you got the most special job in the universe. You get to be a mom.”
Her face crumpled, and oh fuck, his heart was pounding as she leaned forward and buried her face against his neck. “Thank you,” she whispered, but he had no clue what she was thanking him for.
“You’re the one who came all the way out here, all pregnant and sore, and you were bent over an open fire cooking me breakfast. I should be thanking you.”
And then he felt it. She pressed her full lips to the side of his neck, and she laid a kiss right there. He heard the sweet smack of it. Before he could change his mind, he eased back and pressed his lips to hers.
He didn’t even know what the hell he was doing. It had been so long since he’d kissed a woman, but she sure made it easy on him.
Her lips softened, and she slid her arms around his shoulders and pulled him in closer, like she wanted this. He pulled one of his hands from her back and cupped the side of her neck as he kissed her. He didn’t remember ever having a woman melt in his hands before, but she damn-near went boneless on him. He smiled into the kiss as he kept her upright.
“You’re burning the steaks,” Dylan groused.
Garret flinched out of the kiss, startled. Dylan was standing at the mouth of the tent, rubbing sleep from his eyes. His hair stuck up in all directions like he’d jammed a fork in a light socket, which that dumbass did when he was six years old specifically because Mom told him not to, and he’d looked similar to this disheveled state right here.
“Get a room,” Dylan grumbled as he headed for the cast-iron pan.
When Garret looked back to Raynah, her cheeks were a pretty pink color, but she didn’t look like she was blushing from embarrassment. She looked…happy.
Her pupils were a little blown, and she was blinking pretty slowly, but that didn’t bother him. He was glad his kiss had some kind of effect on her.
Kissing her was awesome. He did it again, just a quick one, before he stood and started helping Dylan divide their breakfast onto three paper plates.
She’d come all the way up here to be here for him, and she did not understand how much that meant to a guy like him. Effort was everything. She was full-on pregnant and sore from it, and probably exhausted, but she was still here with smiles, and being all sexy, and sharing her moving belly with him, and damn, he really really liked this woman.
He made sure she had her plate first, before he dragged up a log and sat beside her. Garret could barely keep his eyes off her. He wanted to touch her belly again and see if he could feel little Billy move some more. That probably wasn’t the baby’s name, but that’s what he was going to call him until she picked one. Billy was a tough-guy name. He’d always liked it if he ever had a little boy. Billy the Jackal. So cool. He bet he was going to be a tough little kid. His momma was tough. Tough mommas probably made tough kiddos. He really wanted to feel her belly again.
“You’re staring,” she observed.
He finished chewing his bite before he spoke. “Is he moving?”
“Not right now. He must be tired after the acrobatics show he put on for you. He usually moves a lot if I have orange juice.”
“Shit. I mean shoot. We didn’t bring orange juice.”
She giggled. “It’s okay. He’s probably resting. I’m okay with him taking a nap. There isn’t much room to move around, and the baby has been hurting my back lately.”
“Oh, sorry, buddy,” he told her belly. “No OJ for you. Gotta go easy on your momma.”
Dylan was quiet as they finished breakfast and cleaned up around the campfire, but he usually was silent in the mornings. He was a night owl and hated mornings, so when he spoke, it took Garret by a little bit by surprise.
“Are you ready?”
“Ready for what?” he asked.
“To Change again?”
Dylan must’ve been joking. “You couldn’t pay me enough,” he mumbled, heading to take out the tent stakes.
“The pay is a better quality of life,” Raynah said.
He turned toward them, and they both were staring at him. “What are you talking about,” he asked, straightening his spine.
“Raynah isn’t here to just camp out and eat our food, man.”
He didn’t understand. “She can have as much food as she wants.”
“Come on. Let’s go to the woods,” Raynah said, tilting her head toward the direction he’d just come from. “Not as far as usual though. You have to learn to Change near people.”
“Wait, what?”
Dylan had picked up the remote control for the drone, but Raynah shook her head at him. “No drone this time. I’ll keep track of him. The noise on that thing probably pisses his bear off.”
Dylan lifted his hands in surrender and set the control back in the box. “Whatever you say, boss lady.”
“I’m not the boss of anyone. Just trying to help. Let’s go, wild man. You’re fed, and now you can Change again.”
His stubborn streak was present and accounted for. “I’m not Changing. I just went through that.” Even the thought of another Change right now made him feel short of breath.
“You can’t keep suffering through Changes or letting them run your entire life. You’re overthinking them.” Raynah gestured around at the camp, his truck, and the woods. “This is too much. You can’t do this four times a week.”
“Four times a week?” he nearly choked on the words. “I’m not doing this four times a week.”
Raynah cocked her head, and there was sympathy in her eyes. He didn’t like it. “Hey Dylan, can you give us a minute?”
“Sure. I have to take a piss anyway,” he muttered, and then tromped off into the woods.
“Lots of people have medical conditions,” she started.
“This isn’t a medical condition, it’s a curse.”
“Look, at first everyone deals with their diagnosis different. It just depends on the person, right? And how big the diagnosis is. You take your time to cope, and then you learn about treatment, and you adjust your life so that you can be as healthy as possible.”
“It’s not some sickness, Raynah. I didn’t sign up for this.”
She arched an eyebrow, and he hated how good she was at making sense right now. Yeah, yeah, people diagnosed with sickness didn’t sign up for it either.
“You’re fighting your animal so hard, and you don’t have to.”
“I don’t want him in me.”
“And he can not only hear you say that, he can feel it. If you want a faster Change time, you have to get along with your animal. Hell, get to know him. They’re all different. Your bear has a personality.”
He shifted his weight to the other side and wished he was wearing a sweater right now. He felt very exposed, and the chill was starting to get to him. “What’s your crocodile like?”
“She’s loyal, and loves very sparingly, but very deeply. She’s reluctant to bond to anyone, but once she does, she would die for them. She’s a patient hunter. She’s been hurt. She lashes out sometimes. At least, she was doing that back when I had her. They wouldn’t let us Change in Cold Foot Prison, and by the time I got out, I was pregnant and still couldn’t Change. I miss her very much.”
“They wouldn’t let you Change?”
“They gave us medicine every day to keep the animals suppressed. It felt like torture not being able to Change.”
His heart dropped to the snow, and he averted his gaze so she wouldn’t see how disgusted he was. He wished Cold Foot Prison would burn to ashes. A couple minutes ago, if she would’ve told him she didn’t have to Change for a couple of years, he would’ve envied her, but not after she’d talked so sweetly about her animal.
Raynah loved her crocodile. That much was evident in the softness of her voice.
He felt selfish, but he also felt something else that he couldn’t put his finger on…like he was taking something for granted.
“The faster you get to know your animal and let him in, and let him be your teammate, not your enemy, the faster you can find your new normal.”
He inhaled that frigid air, dragging it into his lungs until they were completely full, and then he let it out and nodded. “I’ll Change again if you want. I don’t want you anywhere close though. I don’t think I would hurt you, but I just want to be safe.”
“You won’t hurt me.”
“Raynah—”
“You won’t. I already met your bear, and he protected me, remember? He knows me. He’ll recognize me.”
“No. No, no, no, you have the baby. I’m not unleashing my grizzly bear around you.”
“Stop saying unleashing him. You are sharing the body. It’s his turn. Let’s go.”
“Raynah—”
“I will show you my titties if you stop arguing and start walking.” She pointed to the woods.
Well, all arguments he might have had just flew out the window.
He nodded once and marched himself right for that forest. “I think we should name the baby Billy,” he said, trying to distract himself from the absolute hell he was about to go through again.
“I’m probably not naming him Billy. Veto. Are you saying nice things to your bear in your mind?”
“I don’t even know how to talk to my bear. He only speaks in my head when he wants me to kill someone, whenever anyone does anything remotely annoying around me. That’s not my favorite conversation. We don’t speak the same language.”
“Okay, that’s a little weird, but yeah, you do speak the same language. You two just don’t know how to care what the other side of you wants yet. Plus, he can feel your intentions. If you have good intentions for him, he will grow to trust you.”
“I don’t have good intentions for him.”
“Yeah, and that’s probably why it takes you an hour to Change. I saw the video of it, by the way. Deeply disturbing.”
“Wait, you saw what?”
“Your brother sent me the drone video of you Changing last night. That is unacceptable. You and your bear are punishing each other for no reason.”
“I…” He frowned. He didn’t like any of this. “I don’t think you should be here.”
“This is good right here. Change and protect me.”
He gestured to her belly. “You really shouldn’t be around someone who has no control.”
She snorted. “I saw you the night you fought Farrah. You didn’t even kill her, and she was a giant cunt.”
Okay, Raynah had a point there. “I’ve never heard a girl say that word.”
“Bra or no bra?”
“What?”
“Do you want to see all of my titties, or just my bra?”
“Umm, I can’t imagine anyone choosing ‘bra.’”
She shrugged out of her jacket like she meant business. “Wait,” he told her, holding out his hands to stop her.
“You don’t want to see them?”
“Not like this. Not when you are just paying a debt. I want you to want to show me your tits. You don’t have to do this. I’ll Change without you having to expose yourself.”
“Oh.” Her eyes dropped to the snow at his boots, but not before he noticed the hurt in her eyes.
He swallowed hard and approached her slowly. “I want to undress you when the time is right.”
“You mean after I have the baby and I look more normal?”
“Uh, I was thinking about four seconds after I drop Dylan off at his house, so he doesn’t pop out and say something stupid like ‘you’re burning the steaks’ and ruin the moment. That’s going to be burned into my mind every time I remember our first kiss now.”
A surprised-sounding laugh escaped her. “Okay, so you still want to see me. Even in this shape.”
“Yes. Very, very, very much. I’ve been thinking about you naked nonstop since you said the word ‘nudes.’ Look at this,” he said, pointing to the zipper of his pants, which was pushed out on account of his erection at just talking about her tits. “You do it for me. I’ve jacked off like ten times since I saw you in Murdoch’s, and guess what I thought about every time?”
“Me?”
“You,” he assured her. “You’re so hot, and you smell good. You’re funny, and you’re confident when you speak, and powerful, and you just have your shit together. You’re this badass crocodile shifter who knows how to actually be a shifter, and your body is bangin’. I have imagined doing filthy things to you just to get you screaming my name, because apparently that’s the only goal I can think about lately. And I liked feeling your baby. There. I like it all.”
She pursed her lips, but she wasn’t doing a very good job of hiding her amused smile. “Truth.”
“I really like your butt, too. The territorial animal in me wishes you would wear the jacket I got you all the time, because you feel kind of like mine, and I know it’s way too soon, but there it is. So long story short, yes, I would love to see your boobs, Raynah. Now, or whenever you want. Pregnant or not pregnant. My dick literally doesn’t care either way.”
She dropped her head, and her shoulders were shaking with repressed laughter. When she looked back up at him, all of the uncertainty in her eyes had faded away. “Do you want to take my jacket off me?”
“I mean, we just talked about how I don’t want you to ever take my jacket off—”
“So you can undress my boobs.”
“Right.” He marched right on over there and pushed her jacket from her shoulders, then pulled the hem of her sweater over her head and…holy shit. She was wearing a black lace bra, and her tits were huge. Like…full and round and spilling-out-of-her-bra huge.
He had never seen anything hotter than how hard that bra had to work to keep her curves confined. “Ooooh, fuck,” he whispered. “Bear, light of my life, best friend,” he muttered sarcastically to himself. “If my brother interrupts this, you can maul him.”
She laughed and squeezed her arms together, pushing her tits up and deepening her cleavage line. “They’re really big right now.”
“Fuck me,” he huffed out, hovering his hands right over the curve of them. He wished he could see the swell of her belly too, but she had on leggings that came all the way up to just under her bra, covering it. He would have to just focus on the boobs, which was okay, because he felt like he was falling into a trance.
He slid his hand to her ribs and around to the back of her bra, unsnapped it, then hooked a finger into the lace fabric and pulled it slowly off her arms. She was perfect. God, she was so perfect.
He cupped her breasts from the sides. She groaned and relaxed her head back, closing her eyes to the sky. “Your hands are so warm,” she murmured as he massaged her. “Feels good.”
His dick throbbed behind the seam of his jeans. He liked when she told him what she liked.
Garret lowered his lips to hers and massaged one of her full breasts while he slipped his other arm around her back and pulled her close. Fuck, he wanted her so bad. He wanted to be buried deep in her, thrusting, relieving them both.
And then she said something that changed the course of his entire life in an instant.
“I’ll let you come on my tits right here if you Change.”
He froze there, one hand on her full breast, his lips an inch from hers. “You won’t want that from me if you see the Change.”
“I will. Do you know why?”
He shook his head.
“Because I’m talking to your animal, too. I like you. I like all of you, just like you like me and speak highly of my crocodile. I don’t want you to be human, do you understand? If you were human, I wouldn’t be here with you. I would think you were too fragile for me. What you are, and who you are, is perfect. I don’t care how you got here. I just care that you’re here. All of you. The man and the animal, because I’m a woman, but also an animal. I need you to be the same kind of monster that I am so you can understand me, and so that I can understand you. I care for the bear, so I’m asking that you care for him too. I want you to take care of him so he can take care of you back when the time comes. I want you to be whole. Change, wild man. I haven’t seen your bear in too long.”
That’s what he’d needed. How did she do that? How did she say exactly what he needed to hear to make his life make sense?
She was right. If he wasn’t this, he wouldn’t have moved here, or met Sasha as his neighbor, and then met Raynah through her. He wouldn’t have been the one to open the door that night when Raynah needed his help. He wouldn’t have seen her holding that little jacket at Murdoch’s, and she wouldn’t have shown up at his house with a baby shower invitation in her coat pocket. He wouldn’t have gotten to see her silly selfie, or talk to her on the phone, or see her in her cute cashier’s apron where she worked.
If the bear didn’t exist, Garret wouldn’t have kissed her in a camp chair on a random snowy mountain because she cared enough to come help him learn to Change faster.
“You’re going to learn to love the power that your animal gives you,” she whispered. “I promise.”
He could tell Raynah spoke of something she absolutely believed, just from the confident tone of her voice.
He released her and put a few yards of distance in between them, and then he begged his animal to make this easier so that he could protect her from how awful it could be.
I’m going to do better for both of us, he said silently in his head. I’m going to get to understand you. I’m going to work on making it easier. And just as his skin started to tingle and burn with the oncoming Change, he said an apology to himself. He said the apology to both sides of himself. I’m sorry I’ve been fighting this so hard.
And then there was pain.